Wednesday, September 07, 2011

The Paradise Prophecy

This is not meant as some kind of backhanded complement, but
in comparison to many other books in the supernatural/horror/conspiracy theory
thriller genre, Robert Browne’s The
Paradise Prophecy is well written.
The genre has gotten so formulaic (probably due to Dan Brown’s huge
success in exploiting the ever more weary formula) that what most distinguishes
the books from one another these days is the quality of the writing. In that sense, Robert Browne excels with this
one even if his plot execution (particularly the book’s ending) is
predictable. I realize that it is
probably too much to expect an author to write one of these books where the
“bad guys” actually win, and that has become my problem with thrillers. In this case, knowing that good would almost
certainly find a way to win over evil, I found myself racing through the final
chapter of The Paradise Prophecy only
to see how the “good guys” would pull their chestnuts out of the fire at the
last second – not to learn who would actually win the book’s final battle. I say this with no fear of spoiling the
book’s ending for other readers; after all, how else would they expect it to end?

The Paradise Prophecy is
an epic battle of good vs. evil, perhaps even the final such battle. Since God seems to have lost interest in the
world, a small group of dark angels (Belial, Moloch, Mamman, and Beelzebub) are
hoping to use the opportunity to take over and open the gates of hell to free
Lucifer for his return to Earth.
Michael, a fallen angel who has not embraced the dark side, with his own
small team of exceptional humans, is all that stands between the demons and
their plot to destroy the world we know.

The “prophecy” in question is believed to have been written
on the seven pages missing for centuries from what has become known as “the
Devil’s bible.” What these pages have to
say is so powerful that it can change the universe forever – for better or
worse. The pages are thought to be
somehow connected to John Milton’s Paradise
Lost and several of Michael’s human cohorts are, when the book begins, busy
trying to crack the code and clues they believe Milton has buried in his
manuscript.

The most interesting part of The Paradise Prophecy does, in fact, involve the research and
detective work accomplished by the book’s two main characters: Louisiana
professor “Batty” LaLaurie and a special agent of the State Department,
Bernadette Callahan. Callahan and
LaLaurie, working as a team, travel the world in search of clues but, because
they are always one step behind the murderous dark angels, the bodies begin to
pile up. Callahan, at first a skeptic of
anything supernatural, is only slowly convinced by LaLaurie’s explanation of
the evidence they uncover that she is dealing with something otherworldly. All of this, of course, leads to the final
confrontation between good and evil in which the fate of mankind will be
determined.

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